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‘Is he what?’
‘In waiting for the role of Prince Charming?’
‘Of course not! And you’re hurting me!’
Alessandro let her go immediately and stepped back, suddenly aware of the build-up of emotion that was flowing between them like a live charge of electricity.
‘This isn’t what it’s about, you know,’ he told her, unerringly going for the soft spot in her defences. ‘Relationships. Men don’t want a woman who screams and provokes attack.’
‘I get the message,’ Megan said, her face burning as she saw herself through his eyes. Punch-drunk, or so he might think. She knew that she wasn’t even close to being out of control. Even though he’d seen her being kissed in front of an audience by a man she claimed she had no interest in, aside from a platonic one.
‘You might believe in the value of melodrama, but has it occurred to you that for every one man who enjoys that sort of stuff there are a hundred who don’t?’
‘I wasn’t being melodramatic. I was just having a bit of fun.’ But the fight had gone out of her. She felt like a Cinderella who hadn’t quite managed to make it to midnight at the ball.
‘I think it’s time Victoria and I left now.’ Alessandro turned away and headed for the door.
He couldn’t believe that he had been totally unaware of the steady thump of music outside, the shouts of laughter emanating from the sitting room and out in the small hallway.
It was a small house, but he still had to hunt down his fiancée, who seemed to be having great fun playing some sort of drinking game with a group of people—including, naturally, the football coach, towards whom Alessandro was beginning to nurture some fairly healthy feelings of hostility.
A regular one-man cabaret show, he thought, grabbing his coat and slinging it on. When he wasn’t slobbering over women, he was holding court with a can of beer in one hand and a cup of punch in the other.
He didn’t know whether Megan was still in the kitchen or not. He hadn’t looked over his shoulder when he had walked out. He would get back to the sanity of Victoria’s Chelsea house, enjoy what would be a predictably superb lunch, and then head back to his own place, where he would usefully be able to catch up with some correspondence.
He would not spend the night at Victoria’s. He never did. She had made noises about Dominic not being old enough to understand the situation until it was more formalised, and Alessandro was fine with that decision. She occasionally stayed the night at his place, though rarely, and that, too, suited him.
He was congratulating himself on the sanity of his life, on the easy preordained lines along which it ran, when the flicker of red caught his eye.
Even at a distance, and amongst a crowd of colourful people, Megan still managed to stand out. She always had. He shook his head, resigned to polite goodbyes, and walked towards her, his hand resting lightly on the back of Victoria’s neck.
‘Water!’ Megan said, pointedly lifting the paper cup she held. She had had time to gather herself, and wasn’t about to let her confrontation with Alessandro wreck her day. People only got under your skin if you allowed them to. She looked at Victoria and laughed. ‘I’m afraid your fiancé thinks I’m a disreputable woman, because I’ve had two cups of punch today.’
This surely wasn’t the same uptight, rigid, painfully polite woman she had met at the Nativity Play at school. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were sparkling. Maybe she had been a little over-indulgent on the punch as well, Megan thought. Poor thing. She’d be in for a stiff lecture on the demon drink.
‘I never realised you disapproved of alcohol.’ Victoria looked at Alessandro with surprise.
‘I don’t,’ Alessandro said through gritted teeth, ‘disapprove of alcohol.’
‘Only the effects of it.’ Megan smiled sweetly at him and piously sipped some of her water.
‘Well…’ Victoria laughed—a proper, warm laugh. ‘Everyone needs to let their hair down now and again. Now, darling, shall we leave?’ She turned to Alessandro, brushing aside his hand in the process and smoothing her hair. ‘It was so good of you both to invite us here for a drink. Super party! But my mother will be tearing her hair out if we stay much longer, and I can’t imagine what havoc Dominic’s been wreaking in my absence! He begged Santa for a football,’ she confided.
‘And let me guess…Santa obliged…?’
‘More than that! Santa managed to get one signed by the captain of the Chelsea team—and of course, Robbie…Mr Chance…’ She pinkened. ‘His new hero, it would appear….’
